by Rachel Ford
Elgin’s face wrinkled in distaste before he could contain the reaction. “You mean…you eat fruit grown from dead people?”
“It’s a tradition that goes back to the earliest days of Trapper’s Colony.”
Of course it is.
“It’s a way for our people to renew life, to give back when we’re gone.” She glanced up at him now, and held his gaze. “Do you see the trees in front of us?”
“Last I checked, there’s nothing wrong with my eyes.”
“Those are all the trees planted since Trapper’s was settled, all the Tribari who died on this planet, up until Halford took over forty-some months ago. There’s about twelve hundred trees there.”
“Then what are these?” he asked, gesturing at the saplings.
“They’re the graves of everyone who died after he took over,” she said simply.
He swallowed, taking in the enormity of her statement. “Halford’s been out of power for thirteen months,” he said doggedly. “He can’t get the blame for all of this.”
“No,” she admitted. “There’s three trees we planted in the first six months after his departure. There haven’t been any more since.”
“Three?”
“That’s right: three.” He could feel her eyes on him, but he was still staring at the saplings. “You’re a soldier. Now you tell me: is there a damned thing you wouldn’t do to keep the crew of the Supernova safe?”
He blinked at the question, but made no answer.
In a moment, she spoke again. “Well, Captain Elgin, these people are my crew. Should I have stood down, and let Halford’s greed keep putting them in the ground?”
“There…there had to be other ways. Official channels.”
“You don’t think I tried those, Captain?” Her tones were raw and authentic.
He refused to look at her, though. “I don’t understand, Governor. What do you want from me? Absolution?” He shook his head. “Even if I agreed with what you did – and I’m not saying I do – what does it matter what I think?”
“I’m not asking for absolution, Elgin.”
He faced her now. “Then what?”
“Courage, Captain. Courage to do the right thing.”
Chapter Eleven
The march started at the fountain. They had been marching for an hour or better. They’d covered most of the district now, and Grel’s voice was hoarse. But he was exhilarated, too. They’d had their share of contemptuous scowls, of course, but he’d never seen so many Tribari citizens freely and openly express their support, either.
There was something about crowds, something to that old adage about safety in numbers. Alone, these men and women would probably never have dared voice sentiments like these for fear of being labeled radical. But when the street was full of others demanding the same basic rights, they found their courage.
“Close the prison colonies,” he called. “No more men and women, no more children, sentenced to death on frozen worlds.”
They were moving from the shops to the open square where the cart merchants would rent a little plot upon which to ply their trade. “Close the colonies,” the crew behind him echoed.
A few cart vendors glanced up, some alarmed, others curious. “Fair wages now,” he continued. “Dignity for all Tribari. We are people, not machines.”
He saw a matron sitting at a little table outside a café. She was dressed in fabric of silvers and golds, accompanied by a small boy. She shook her head with contempt, and the gems of her headpiece jingled and clattered against each other like chimes in a breeze.
How many people, he wondered, would just one of those baubles feed? He didn’t recognize her personally, but he recognized the fifteen braids that hung below that headdress, and the ostentatiousness of her dress. She was the wife of a Grand Contributor, and the pudgy youth at her side, similarly dressed in golds and silvers, was probably their heir, a future Grand Contributor.
Her eyes had fixed on him as they neared the café, the pupils narrowed and the irises turned a steely, hateful gray. He held her gaze and spoke again. “The Contributors take our waking hours, they take our health, they take our wealth, and then they leave us to die, broken and broke. No more!”
She spat, now, and though it landed short, he didn’t think that was by design.
“They say labor is a commodity, but they get to set the price. And if we try to negotiate a better rate for our own time, our own lives – well, we all remember what happened to the Carter’s Guild, don’t we?” He turned to the cart vendors as he said this. A few knowing nods answered, and a few eyes returned fearfully to their wares.
“No more. We have the right to organize. By law we have the liberty of speech and assembly, as much as the Contributors. We have the right to demand that our lives, our labor, our rights are respected.”
The matron stood, now, taking her son by the arm. She cast an imperious gaze at the assembled protesters, and shook her head.
Grel grinned. “I think we’ve offended her ladyship there. But if you think hearing about it is bad, Madam Contributor, imagine how much more distasteful it is to go to bed hungry every night; to lack clean water; to see your children starve a little more every day; to lose family for lack of medicine, because you can’t pay the entry fee for the hospitals.”
A voice, now, from the crowd reached his ears. Grel glanced about for the speaker. He was a young man, perhaps his own age, though he had the look of a man who had lived a rough life. There were lines of premature age at the sides of his eyes and the corner of his mouth. “Perhaps,” he was saying, “your problems would be fewer if you got off your ass and worked a job.”
He spoke with an accent, although Grel could not immediately place it. He answered, “That, my friend, is easier to do when there are jobs.” Behind him, voices echoed their agreement. Unemployment had reached record levels on the home planet. Everyone knew that.
“There are always jobs,” the other man said.
He scrutinized the speaker. “You must be new to Central.” He shook his head. “There aren’t jobs here. Not anymore. Not since the farms introduced automation. Now there’s three hundred applicants for any job – from street sweep to apprentice dressmaker. And the jobs that still remain don’t pay enough for living. People are starving – dying.”
For a minute, the stranger hesitated in the face of these statistics. In the next, he offered, “Well, if that’s so, you’ll have to go elsewhere. To where the jobs are.”
“And where is that? Where, in all of blessed creation, are there jobs and living wages and basic rights for all of us?” A murmur of assent rose from his group, and here and there from the merchants and shoppers. It was grim and raw, and spoke far more eloquently to his point than his own words might have done.
But his interlocuter was unconvinced. He shook his head, saying, “I’m sure there’s-”
His platitude was interrupted by one of the shopkeepers. “Enough. Get the hell out of here already. We don’t want your brand of trouble.”
“Aye,” another called. “We’ve worked hard for what we have. We don’t need parasites like you mucking shit up.”
A few cart vendors agreed. The rest returned to studying the various surfaces of their workspace, or the wares they sold day in and day out.
“We only-” Grel cut off short. From the distance, he saw something fly through the air toward him. He glanced in the direction of the thrower, searching for who it might have been, and a moment later heard a woman cry out. He turned to see a stream of blue gushing from Deb’s face.
In a moment, it seemed the dam of restraint and decency had broken. The entire plaza descended into chaos. All around him, men and women turned on one another. His protests, his reminders that violence was not, would never be, the answer fell on deaf ears.
Something grazed his head, and he ducked. He felt an arm grab at his elbow, and turned. It was Franz. “We need to go, Grel. The protectors will be here any minute.”
He hesitat
ed, his mind a mass of confusion. What in the gods’ names just happened? In the blink of an eye, words had become fists, and worse. “Grel,” Franz shouted. “Now!”
This time, he complied. Staying to fight would accomplish nothing. It only meant being present when the protectors arrived; and that someone had called them in, perhaps the same someone who had aimed for his head, he didn’t doubt. The two men made their way through the masses of bodies toward a side alley. Others seemed to have come to a similar conclusion, that flight in the particular instance was better than fight.
The throng of people undulated this way and that, but at last he and Franz were able to make it away. The sounds of screams, the angry, raised voices of protectors, echoed after them.
They ran, and kept running until the marketplace was far behind them. “My gods,” he rasped out, pausing for breath. “What the hell just happened?”
“I don’t know,” Franz wheezed. “I’m just glad we got out of there before the protectors showed up.”
Chapter Twelve
Supervisor Gri had stopped by Nik’s desk bright and early to inquire if all was well. “Yes,” she responded, trying to keep the astonishment at this unexpected attention out of her tone. “Thank you, Supervisor.”
“Of course. And with your family as well?”
“Yes.” Then, she frowned. “Actually, Supervisor, might I have a word? In private?”
Gri straightened and nodded, as if he was honored to be taken into whatever confidence she was about to impart. “Of course, Nik. My door is always open to you.”
A minute later, they were seated in his office. “Now,” he said, “how can I help?”
“I wanted first to inform you that I am expecting a child.”
Her manager’s eyes widened. “I see. Well, of course, you need not have any concerns in regard to your job. You are one of our star employees, Nik: whatever minor inconveniences may arise with the pregnancy, we shall be glad to accommodate you.”
She forced a smile. She hadn’t considered the implications of pregnancy on her job. With no laws to protect pregnant employees, Tribari women were often at the mercy of men like Gri when the situation arose. And considering that it was the first thing to come to his mind, she had a strong impression that, were she not the daughter of Grand Contributors, this conversation might have gone a very different way. “You are very kind, Supervisor.”
“Not at all.”
“I wonder, too, if I might ask a favor.”
“Of course.”
“I promised my mer and der I would call them this morning. I wonder if I might, on my break, make the call from your private line?”
He nodded briskly. “Absolutely. Their privacy is paramount. And yours, of course, too.” Again, she thanked him, and again he assured her it was nothing. “In fact, I will leave you to it now.”
Her five minutes of freedom were not for another two hours. “But my break-”
He tutted, though, and brushed it away. “Nevermind that, Nik. We mustn’t leave Grand Contributors waiting.” He laughed nervously. “Must we?”
She smiled. “I suppose not. Thank you, Supervisor.”
He nodded again, and took his leave. She sidled into his seat, and dialed not her parents, but Dr. Kel’s office. She reached the receptionist, who said, “Ah, Nikia Idan.”
“Good morning. I wanted to-”
“Forgive me for interrupting. But the doctor asked to speak to you himself, if you called. One moment, and I will transfer you.”
Her face disappeared from the screen, and in another second Dr. Kel’s materialized. “Nik,” he said. “Good morning.”
“Dr. Kel,” she nodded. “I need to cancel my appointment next week.”
“Good. Excellent.” He smiled, and she grinned. “I’m delighted to hear it, Nik.”
“Thank you, doctor. And thank you for the advice.”
He nodded. “All part of the service.”
After closing the line to Kel, though, she did call her parents. She reached Elsa first. “Oh, Nik.” Her mother was ecstatic. “I can’t wait to see you. Your father told me all about your conversation, of course. I’m so happy, darling. Did you talk to him yet?”
“I did.” Nikia grinned – she couldn’t contain her joy – and her mother squealed at the sight. “He said yes.”
“Oh Nik,” she said again. Her eyes were misting, and Nikia could feel her own watering too. She wasn’t even sure why, except that the sight of her mother’s joy, and the excess of her own happiness, was perhaps too much to contain. “I feel such a fool that we didn’t do this sooner. It shouldn’t have taken a baby. I hope you will forgive us.”
She’d barely begun to reassure her mother when Elsa turned, calling, “Luk. Luk, come here. It’s Nik.”
She heard distant footsteps, and saw her father enter the room behind Elsa.
“Luk, she talked to him, to Grel. And he – well, I’ll let you tell, darling.”
Her father’s face loomed large on the screen now, and her mother’s shifted to make room for him. “Nik.”
There was a warmth in his greeting that rather renewed the mistiness in her own eyes, it had so long been absent in their interactions. “Father.”
“What did he say?”
She smiled, blinking the tears away. “He said yes, der. He’s going to call you this afternoon.”
Luk laughed out loud with relief and wrapped an arm around his wife, squeezing her to him. “Oh my gods, I’m so glad, Nik. We both are.”
“So glad,” her mother put in.
“And father?”
“Yes?”
“You were right.” Another day, it would have been a painful admission. But today, she was too happy to let pride interfere. “You both were.”
Luk smiled, a tender smile. “It happens every once in a while, baby girl. Don’t get used to it.”
She grinned, and then he and Elsa did too; and in a minute they were all laughing. And, before she knew it, she was crying too, with sheer pleasure.
“Listen, Nik,” her father said, “maybe it would be better if we spoke face-to-face, Grel and I. It doesn’t have to be anywhere expensive, or anything I own. We could go somewhere neutral. I don’t want him to feel like I’m trying to show him up or anything like that. But we could all get together. Like a family.”
She nodded. “I think it’s a great idea, der.” Now, though, another idea presented itself to her mind. “What about Diven? Does he know?”
“Not yet,” Elsa said. “We didn’t want to say anything to your brother…well, in case it didn’t work out.”
“Thanks mer. I appreciate that.”
“Of course, darling. And we’re going to hold off. He’s busy, you know. We want to work everything out first.”
“You mean,” she said with a wry smile, “so he can’t object.”
“Don’t worry about Diven, Nik,” Luk said. “He’s pigheaded, but he’ll come around.”
“Pigheaded,” Elsa observed, “seems to run in this family.” They laughed again.
What Supervisor Gri might have thought, standing outside the office door and listening to their laughter, she didn’t know, any more than she could guess what he thought when she emerged, red-eyed from weeping tears of joy. But he was standing there, on the other side of the door, pretending not to listen. And he did regard her with a measure of surprise. “I hope all is well, Nik?”
“Very well,” she said, wiping self-consciously at her eyes. “Forgive me, I was…well, a little overcome, I’m afraid.”
He nodded. “The first two months are the hardest,” he declared sagely. “My own wife struggled during the beginning. After two months, though, it got better. The doctors said that’s when the hormones started regulating.” He added confidentially, and with complete obliviousness, “It was quite the relief, I can tell you.”
Nikia, though, was in too good a mood to take the words to heart. “Well,” she said, “I’m sure I’ll be relieved too.”
&nbs
p; It was sometime after third bell when Gri returned to their shared office space, a look of concern spread across his features. He cleared his throat to get their attention. “Um. There’s been reports of unrest in the marketplace. Protectors are on heightened alert.”
Nikia felt her heart sink. Oh gods. The marketplace was the site of Grel’s rally.
“Contributor Gulan has instructed that we are to close the office early today. He’s requested an escort for those of you who live in that area. And there’s a shuttle on its way to take the rest of you to the station.”
“Supervisor,” she said, getting out of her seat. “What’s going on? What do you mean, unrest?”
He seemed surprised by the question but endeavored to answer all the same. “I’m not entirely sure, Nik. Violence of some kind. Sounds like there’s a lot of protectors onsite.” He shrugged. “That’s why Contributor Gulan has asked for the escort, so none of his workers are mistaken for anarchists.”
Anarchists. Oh gods. She nodded, though, and asked, “When is the shuttle going to be here?”
“In about fifteen minutes. So if you’ll all clock out and get ready…”
“I’ll leave now.”
Gri frowned. “It’s not safe. That’s why he’s called the shuttle.”
But Nikia wouldn’t – couldn’t – wait fifteen minutes. “It’ll be faster walking,” she said, punching out as she spoke. “I am gratified by the Contributor’s thoughtfulness, Supervisor, and your concern. But I can’t wait.”
She left him mystified and threw on her overcoat as she went. The streets were crowded, and though no hint of violence had reached this far north, there was a tension in the air that was almost palpable.
She headed for the station at a run. She was stopped once by a protector, but hearing her explanation – “I need to get home to my husband, so he doesn’t worry, with all the talk of riots” – he let her pass.
She boarded the first train available. The ride back was torture. It had been one thing when she’d been heading back on her own two feet. The urgency of the exercise had given her something to do other than thinking.
